It was not a gold but the crowd roared as though it was. Rebecca Adlington won Britain's first medal in the swimming pool, a bronze in the 400m freestyle, and the rapturous reaction she received moved her to tears. "I am crying because it is so overwhelming," she said, a smile spreading across her face as she spoke. "The crowd was amazing. It is what got me from fourth to third." Waves of noise started at the top of the vertiginous heights of the two stands, 202 steps up, and rolled down to break over her as she swam and as she spoke. They ebbed only when people paused to draw breath. And they did not have much of a chance to do that because there was so much to cheer.

Aside from Adlington's medal two world records were broken on the night. The first went to the USA's Dana Vollmer, who became the first woman in history to go under 56 seconds in the 100m butterfly. The other was set by South Africa's Cameron van der Burgh, who finished the 100m breaststroke in 58.45sec. His win was all the more moving because he should have been racing against his best friend in the sport, the Norwegian world champion Alexander Dale Oen. But Dale Oen died, from heart failure, on 30 April. His personal best would have won him silver on the night.

Then there was Michael Phelps's 17th Olympic medal, a silver in the 4x100m freestyle. That race was, perhaps, the pick of a particularly ripe bunch. Phelps and his two team-mates Cullen Jones and Nathan Adrian had given the US a huge lead after the first three legs. And the last man in was – who else? – Ryan Lochte, the newly crowned Olympic champion in the 400m individual medley. But Lochte was blitzed, blown out of the water by France's Yannick Agnel in what was one of the most memorable relay splits of all time. He swam 46.74sec. The current world record for the 100m free, outside a relay, is 46.91sec. Given that Adlington was beaten by Camille Muffat, it was an exceptional night for France.

Even for the most tolerant of British fans, all that time spent listening to South African, French, Australian and US fans celebrating can get a little wearing. What the crowd really wanted was a little British success, especially after the lowering start to the session, when Ellen Gandy finished eighth in the 100m butterfly final. Adlington gave them that.

Adlington may have won gold in Beijing but she said she did not even expect a medal here. Certainly she was never the favourite to win this race. That was Muffat, who had swum under 4min 04sec more times in the last two months than Adlington has in the last two years. Such consistency made her victory seem almost inevitable. She won in a time of 4:01.45, an Olympic record. Adlington finished in 4:03.01.

Muffat had the advantage of an inside lane, while Adlington was stranded out in lane eight after being drawn in a slow heat in the morning session. She said she "couldn't see anything". A way inside her the USA's Allison Schmitt, who won silver, was alongside Muffat. The two battled for the lead throughout. Adlington, on the other hand, spent most of the race holding steady in fifth, before moving into third with 100m to go. Swimming blind, she said she had to "just put my head down and go for it".

It was a brave swim, born out of, as she said, "12 years of hard work". Since Beijing Adlington has spent 4,992 hours' training in the 25m pool where she practises in Nottingham, four hours a day, six days a week, enduring what her coach, Bill Furniss, calls "the sick bucket sessions". All the while she was fuelled by thoughts of what she might achieve here. She is, she said herself, "a totally different person and a totally different swimmer" from the young girl who shocked the world in 2008. Older, wiser and even a little more scarred, she has grown into a woman Furniss describes as "a real fighter". Now the public has seen what Adlington is really about, away from the headlines and puff pieces. She earned her medal through grit and racing nous. It bodes well for the 800m which starts on Thursday, which is, after all, her favourite event.

The only really disappointing aspect of Adlington's swim was that, like Gandy, Fran Halsall and Hannah Miley, she was faster at the Olympic trials, held in this same pool in March. She reckons it is a touch of stage fright. "This is what we have been waiting for for seven years and it is all new for us," she said. "I felt really emotional before my race and that takes its toll." Beforehand she had been too terrified even to look up at the crowd. "You feel sick, you go from feeling like you want to faint, to feeling like you want to cry, to feeling angry. You have so many different emotions going on. It has only just sunk in today that I am at the London Olympics. I feel like we are all only just realising it at different points."

Her team-mates do seem to be catching on. Three of them reached finals on the night. Robbie Renwick went through seventh-fastest for the final of the 200m freestyle, behind Lochte and Sun Yang. He promised he could go "a lot faster" than his 1:46.65. More promisingly still, Liam Tancock was third-fastest in the semis of the 100m backstroke. He went shoulder-to-shoulder with France's world champion Camille Lacourt, just as he had done in the morning's heats. And Gemma Spofforth, who won the world 100m backstroke title in 2009, qualified sixth for the final here.

And British swimming can claim a little credit for one of the most extraordinary stories of the Games. Ruta Meilutyte is a 15-year-old from Lithuania who moved to Plymouth to study at Lipson Community College. She trains at Plymouth College, under the British coach Jon Rudd. She set a new European record in the semi-finals of the 100m breaststroke, beating both Leisel Jones, Australia's Olympic champion, and Rebecca Soni, the US world champion.